ure
the torture, by adding reproach to horror. All reasoning with ourselves
in such cases acts upon us like the reason of another person, which,
however kindly done, serves but to insult the misery we suffer. If
reason could remove the pain, reason would have prevented it. If she
could not do the one, how is she to perform the other? In all such cases
we must look upon Reason as dispossessed of her empire, by a revolt
of the mind. She retires herself to a distance to weep, and the ebony
sceptre of Despair rules alone. All that Reason can do is to suggest,
to hint a thought, to signify a wish, to cast now and then a kind
of bewailing look, to hold up, when she can catch the eye, the
miniature-shaded portrait of Hope; and though dethroned, and can dictate
no more, to wait upon us in the humble station of a handmaid.

XXVIII. AGRARIAN JUSTICE.

Editor's introduction:

This pamphlet appeared first in Paris, 1797, with the title: "Thomas
Payne a La Legislature et au Directoire. Ou la Justice Agraire opposee a
la Loi Agraire, et aux privileges agraires. Prix 15 sols. A Paris, chez
la citoyenne Ragouleau, pres le Theatre de la Republique, No. 229. Et
chez les Marchands de Nouveautes." A prefatory note says (translated):
"The sudden departure of Thomas Paine has pre-vented his supervising the
translation of this work, to which he attached great value. He entrusted
it to a friend. It is for the reader to decide whether the scheme here
set forth is worthy of the publicity given it." (Paine had gone to Havre
early in May with the Monroes, intending to accompany them to America,
but, rightly suspecting plans for his capture by an English cruiser,
returned to Paris.) In the same year the pamphlet was printed in
English, by W. Adlard in Paris, and in London for "T. Williams, No.
8 Little Turnstile, Holborn." Paine's preface to the London edition
contained some sentences which the publishers, as will be seen,
suppressed under asterisks, and two sentences were omitted from the
pamphlet which I have supplied from the French. The English title adds a
brief resume of Paine's scheme to the caption--"Agrarian Justice opposed
to Agrarian Law, and to Agrarian Monopoly." The work was written in the
winter of 1795-6, when Paine was still an invalid in Monroe's house,
though not published until 1797.

The prefatory Letter to the Legislature and the Directory, now for the
first time printed in English, is of much historical interest, an